Atlas
by Knight of Infinity
Summary: A boy, forced to seek treatment in America after a serious car accident, meets a broken man beneath the crying sky. When he returns home...


**AN: Reposted chapter with some edits.**

 **On why I am writing this, I am merely doing so to satisfy on of the unspoken rules of fanfiction: the Law of the Badass Character. It states that in each fandom, there must be one fanfiction that has a badass protagonist. And plus, Oregairu is one of my favorite fandoms.**

* * *

 _"The sky is cryin' / Can't you see the tears roll down the street?"_

 _-Stevie Ray Vaughan_

 **ATLAS**

Prologue: Tears of the Sky

He first saw the figure when he was about to be murdered.

It was, as it seemed to perpetually in the city, was raining, the low rumble of thunder roaring through his ears. The occasional flash of lightning illuminated the landscape, yet except for the occasional flickering streetlights that lined the roads, there was only darkness.

He had been walking, as usual, moping about the shithole where he had led himself in life, without knowing nor caring where he went. He had aimlessly wandered through the streets, without destination nor a sense of finality, meandering throughout the convoluted, twisted veins of the dying city.

It was the only thing he now knew how to do. His life was now filled with the pain of apathy, of seeming nonexistence, his days passing by meaninglessly, no matter how hard he tried to take hold of them. He had tried everything - ranging from soccer to painting to coding - yet for each and every one of them, he failed to exhibit even the slightest modicum of talent.

And thus, he spent his days embracing the squalor of the city, its darkness and corruption far more comfortable to him than repulsive, its hopelessness and defeatism soothing rather than discomforting.

He had been so engrossed in his dark thoughts that he nearly missed the barrel of the gun as it flashed in the dim light, pointing directly at his face.

Surreal murmurs of a crazed man swirled into his mind, dizzying and mesmerizing, and for a moment, he felt as if he were in the midst of a dream.

"Money...money...money, MONEY!" The metal barrel of the gun glinted faintly, yet threateningly, moving in almost hypnotic circles as it drew ever closer to his head. "Give me some fuckin' MONEY! I ain't playing around or no shit like that!"

The gun went off, and he saw the faint flash of gunpowder through the pouring sheets of rain, the sudden clap even more resonating than the thunder that had rolled through merely moments before.

His first instinct was to scream.

Or at least try to.

Despite the fact that his mouth was wide open, despite the fact that he was moving air through his vocal chords, despite the fact that he was desperately trying, he simply could not scream.

It wasn't anything physical, he knew. The debilitating injuries to his nervous systems did not in affect autonomous functions such as breathing, and thus it should have been as easy as an exhale outwards for him to let out a scream.

Yet, somehow, he found that he couldn't. His own mind betrayed him, paralyzing his body with thoughts of helplessness and pathetic fear.

Uncontrollable rage had enveloped his mind, blinding his senses, and in that moment, he could not have hated himself more than he did.

It had always ended up this way. His inevitable, inescapable victimization, his unpreventable cowardliness in the face of adversity, his unchanging position as the unimportant trash of the world that existed merely for others to exploit for end after end after end.

As he stood there, shaking both from the cold and from his overpowering fear, all-too-familiar questions of self-disgust and self-hatred arose within him.

Why was he so very weak?

Why was he so pathetically useless?

Why was he so invisible?

All his life, he had been invisible to everyone, looked through as if he were merely a transparent apparition. Average, perhaps even less-than-average, looks. Average grades. Average house. Average family. Average life.

Everyone seemed to outshine him. His classmates all had something to claim for themselves, whether it be academics, sports, hobbies, or even social suavity. His neighbors were all doing something unique that they themselves could only do. His sister had better grades, was better looking, and was doted upon by their parents.

He, on the other, was the very definition of mediocrity itself.

His useless, pathetic life flashed before his eyes, memories of absolutely nothing but wasted time and lost chances, and he gritted his teeth painfully, ignoring the coppery tang of blood as it flowed into his mouth.

If he survived...

If he survived, what would he do differently?

The bitter, sardonic part of him laughed cruelly.

Everything, of course.

It was only here, in the end, did he realize how very dim-witted he had been. How pathetic he had been. How idiotic he had been.

But did that matter? Did that change anything about the situation he was in? Would it save him, grant him another chance at life?

No.

There was nothing left in this world that he could do, but to drown himself in a sea of his own regrets.

Except for maybe...

Desperately, he latched onto his one last chance of hope, even though rationally, he knew it to be a stupid and useless folly, just like the rest of his actions throughout his entire life.

He prayed.

He had never been a particularly religious person, although he had often participated in the religious festivals in his native Japan. The thought of gods and divinity had never really interested him before, except for the constructions that he himself had designed in middle school.

But in that moment, he was willing to do anything for one more chance.

A monk once said, "When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world. I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation. When I found I couldn't change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn't change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family. Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family and I could have made an impact on our town. Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world."

Never before had he fully grasped the meaning of the monk's quotation, until, of course, when it was far too late.

He almost laughed at the stupid angst of his previous philosophy. It was, in the end, the very thing that he had tried to distance himself from, wasn't it?

Disgusting, revolting, attempts to feel better about himself. An unwillingness to even challenge how things were, a defeatist perspective that was of infinite resignation. Allowing himself to bend the will of everyone and everything, a doormat for everyone to wipe their feet on, in a delusional des

He was just like the Sophists that he hated so much.

The world suddenly snapped into clarity as he saw the gun raise towards him and the crazed, cruel smile of the man in front of him.

Was this the end?

He roared, and this time, it erupted from his mouth, as if it were river breaking through a dam that had held it back for so long.

If it was, then he would go down defiantly, and not like the coward that he was in life.

If he would die, then it would most definitely be with a rejection of that failed, self-pitying self that had chained him throughout his life.

If this were to be the end, he would go out with a fucking bang.

The boom of a gun rose above the wet air. The bright flash of a gun lit up the dark alley. The sound of a bullet smashing into its target crackled like a whip.

A flash of darkness with two blue orbs of fire rippled in front of him, seemingly appearing out of nowhere, as if it were a vengeful demon unleashed upon the hapless.

Idly, he wondered if it was the spirit of death, come to take his soul.

He closed his eyes, already in preparation for the comforting haze of blackness that would undoubtedly take over in seconds, if not moments.

It was over in a flash.

A scream pierced the cloak of rain that poured down upon the city, one of fright and pain, evoking chills in the hearts of all those who heard it.

Slowly, he opened his eyes, confused. There was none of the blossoming pain that he was expecting, none of the crimson liquid that he expected to flood down his body, none of the murky, nebulous haze of death that he believed would come.

And, even more strangely...

The man...the man was gone.

He had been swept away so quickly, it was almost as if he had never been there in the first place. There at one moment, and gone the next.

All he had seen in that brief moment before he had closed his eyes was the startling blue eyes of his savior, shrouded in protective darkness, swooping through the air so quickly that it was hard to even believe it had occurred.

But there was no doubt in his mind that he had been saved, by an augur of justice cloaked by the very same darkness that represented the fear and despair of the dying city.

He had stood there for a full minute afterwards, too shocked to speak, or even move. It was only after a police car screeched into the vicinity, and the angry, yet relieved, voice of his caretaker reached his ears that he was finally shaken out of his reverie.

The next day, he went to the library, a desiccated veneer of its former glory, yet a still proud institution of scholarship, searching for evidence of his mysterious savior.

As he found out merely moments after asking the librarian, the figure was a legend.

It was a name that was almost taboo within the city. A name spoken only in hushed whispers and worried glances. A name synonymous with fear itself.

He had said out loud in disbelief and incredulity when he heard it, only to be silenced by furious glares that picked away directly at his desire to fit in.

The librarian had proceeded to tell him that the figure was evil, a callous murderer who was merely a masked freak running around the town, desecrating its good and decent name.

She refused to say more after that, despite his pleas. Instead, she showed him to a massive room containing the daily editions of the city's newspaper since its founding many years before.

When he left hours later, nearing midnight and far past his curfew, he could only wonder about the man who lay beneath the mask.

For the next month, he had scoured the city, from the richest neighborhoods to the most broken down of slums, searching for a sign of his savior. He had nothing better to do anyhow.

Boredom and apathy, rather than the agonizing niceties of girls, had now become his greatest enemy.

It was not long before he found him. After all, he often traversed through the most crime-ridden areas of the city, and it was only a matter of time before he would encounter the figure once more.

The time came and passed.

Just like that day, it rained heavily, the pounding droplets of water falling as if they were sorrowful tears from the sky itself.

But this time, many things, so many things, were different.

The man who had stood so strong in front of him, who had saved him in that dank, dark alleyway, now knelt, keeled over and slumped. The black cape that had fluttered like a flag in the wind lay half-torn off, its edges ripped and frayed, stained a brilliant vermilion. The armor that had absorbed all the light that came from the faint sources above was rent and dented, caved in here and there, hanging precariously from slumped shoulders.

The mask that had fit the figure's face so perfectly was cracked, the once smooth planes fractured, revealing the face of the man beneath.

It suddenly dawned upon him.

The man...

He was broken.

Heavy sobs reached his ears, and unconsciously, he pulled himself back into the shadows, unsure of what to do.

Idly, he noted the trickle of red that spilled into a nearby storm drain built into the sidewalk, mixing with the pouring rainwater from above.

He followed its source back to the man, and shuddered. The blood loss was unimaginable and serious to the extent of being nearly incapacitating.

The figure was demonized by the press, he recalled. Disparaged and decried in public, detested by the sheep that knew no better, yet whose words hurt all the same.

Yet the man still fought on, uncaring of the opinions of other, uncaring of the past mistakes he had made, uncaring of the regrets that tortured his soul, striving to achieve a beautiful dream.

Even one as dull and as untalented as he was could discover what the figure's purpose was. He had spent hours after hours spent poring over texts and newspapers in the library, connecting point after point, and drawing conclusion after conclusion.

It was to restore a forgotten legacy to a dying city, a city that had once stood proudly and gloriously, but was now merely a shadow of its former self. A city that was once great, but now merely forgotten.

It was, perhaps, one of the most noble of causes for man, something that would not take just a decade, but an entire lifetime, or perhaps even several lifetime, to realize it.

But in the end, despite all the years and expenses and pain, the figure's efforts seemed to be for naught. The city seemed to remain as dark and hopeless as it had before, criminals strolling through the streets fearlessly, citizens fleeing in fear, politicians corrupted and greedy, and the figure's own image slandered as a perverted antithesis of his true purpose.

Betrayed by the very people he was trying save. How tragically ironic was that?

In essence, the figure was a scapegoat. A whipping boy. A cat's paw.

There were some who romanticized such people, who fought against forces far greater than themselves, pitting their own frail, erroneous ideals against the ruthless wheel of the world. It was, after all, the very definition of an Aristotelian tragic hero: One who was not eminently good and just, whose misfortune was brought about not by vice or depravity, but by some error or frailty.

They, the ones who glorified such people, were stupid. Those who were underdogs always lost and were never remembered, despite how it was portrayed in the movies. There would always the unsung, the unknown persons who acted from the shadows, sacrificing their chance for glory to secure a better future. People who would never be known that willingly threw themselves into the cogs of fate, in a desperate attempt to save mankind.

Why glorify them, when they would never be remembered anyways? All it did was cheapen the deeds that they had performed, and deprived them of the quiet satisfaction and pride they took in their actions.

He, as a fundamentally lazy and unambitious teenage boy, had no desire to become one of them. After all, hadn't he suffered readily enough?

Invisible to all, despite his best efforts otherwise. Untalented, cursed with abysmal science and math skills, and blessed only mediocre talent in the humanities. Paralyzed in his right arm, his C5 and C6 nerves severed, so severely that even the best medical facilities in the city barely helped with the palsy. The very idea that he would make himself suffer, for the sake of others people's happiness, of all things, was laughable at the very least.

But...

But as he stood there, staring at the broken man that wept in front of him, he couldn't help but feel a strange, unknown emotion stir in his chest, one that seemed vaguely empty, yet strangely comforting and warm within.

Despite the fact his heart felt like it would break, he couldn't tear his eyes away.

Despite the horrid sight that seared itself into his soul, he couldn't turn away.

Despite the ugly truth that lay before him, he couldn't help but think it was beautiful.

He suddenly realized he had stepped out from the shadows and stood in front of the sobbing figure, as if he were a God that stood before a penitent sinner.

An impassive feeling overcame him, and for a moment, war was waged within his mind.

What was he to do?

Report the figure to authorities? Abandon him? Take him to a hospital? Call his caretaker?

Phantom words floated to the surface of his mind.

 _What I really need is to get clear about what I must do, not what I must know, except insofar as knowledge must precede every act. What matters is to find a purpose, to see what it really is that God wills that I shall do; the crucial thing is to find a truth which is truth for me, to find the idea for which I am willing to live and die._

He didn't really know why that quotation had suddenly appeared to him. After all, he was no Christian, and the idea of an all-powerful God, was, to him, rather ridiculous.

Yet...

A revelation came upon him, and in that moment, he understood what he had to do.

He came to a decision.

Slowly, he extended a hand, and the man looked up at him, his startling azure eyes filled with the faintest speck of hope in spite of the tears that trickled down his cheeks.

Only three words were spoken, but so powerful and important they were that they changed the course of fate for thousands, if not millions, of people.

* * *

 _"It was like meeting someone out of your dreams, or fantasies, or a beloved character from a favorite book."_

 _-James Patterson_

 **ATLAS**

Chapter 1: The Many Meetings

"Service Club?" he asked, holding the odd piece of paper in his hands, giving it a perusal glance.

His Modern Japanese teacher, Hiratsuka Shizuka, nodded in a oddly satisfied manner, lips tightly clenched around a cigarette.

"Yes, Hikigaya." she said, kicking back casually in her chair, fluidly removing the cigarette from her lips as she did so. "Service Club. What about it?"

He sighed. How many times did the infernal woman have to bother him per day, nagging him continually, about everything from his grades (how was second in his grade not good enough?), to his lack of friends (which didn't really matter, at least not to him), and even to the way he wrote his essays (he had even stopped expressing his trademark cynicism outright and instead talked about Leibniz and Pangloss...and subtly Candide, of course).

"Is it even necessary for me to join a club?" he deadpanned. "If I'm not mistaken, this particular school does not have a policy dictating mandatory participation in a club, due to its heavy focus on academics."

A dark glare suddenly fixed upon him, as if it were a Stinger missile upon a helicopter engine, and he had to refrain from making an audible gulp.

Women were scary, he had learned in the past year. The ones he had encountered in the past year while accompanying his benefactors ranged from mildly to batshit insane; furthermore, despite their usual mutual dislike for one another, a good amount of the women had even slept - rather violently, might he had - with his benefactor.

Except for the one with the mallet.

Oh, that fucking mallet. The one time she had come close to him, it had fractured the bone in his left arm in three separate places and landed him in the hospital for a good month.

Talk about a crazy psychotic bitch.

"It is necessary. Did you forget I'm your guidance counselor?" Hiratsuka growled. "You can't ignore what I say unless your parents sign you off, and that's definitely a far stretch."

Her rant continued, and, slowly, his mind drifted away, occasionally nodding as so to pretend he was still listening.

School so far had been...interesting, to say the least. It seemed to him that his entire class was full of completely twisted and unnecessarily fucked up people.

Take, for example, the unofficial class leader, Hayama Hayato. Popular, suave, nice, an athletic, at surface glance, he seemed to be the paragon of the modern day knight. Completely and utterly flawless.

Yet he knew something was off.

No one, he knew, could be that perfect. Not even his mentor had a perfect mask that could not be seen past.

And sure enough, after merely an hour of close observation, he had found cracks in the facade. A strained smile here, an overtly genuine laugh there, and a subtle, threatening flash of the eyes that occurred after a few outrageous comments.

Still, he had to commend the other boy. Being able to keep up such a mask of infallibility and empathy constantly had to be something of an accomplishment, something that he definitely could not do. He sorely lacked the acting skills necessary to do so, a fault that often got him in hot water with his mentor.

Another strange classmate was that contemptuous silver-haired girl who always arrived late to class, and was blatantly rude and disrespectful to her teachers when they attempted to talk to her about her tardiness.

Yet, despite the brusque and uncaring personality she exhibited at school, there were times, when she thought no one else was looking, in which her expression would soften and her eyes fill with restrained emotion and tiredness.

The one time he had approached her when she was in this state, in order to ask her some question about a project they were doing in class, she had squeaked almost bloody cutely, blushing violently and stuttering.

Before, of course, responding in an exceedingly cold, yet still somewhat flustered, manner

He almost snorted out loud. He was willing to bet good money that she was a tsundere.

Despite their immense propagation in Japan's anime, manga, and video game industries, real-life tsunderes were far more rare and difficult to find. He himself had never encountered such a likely candidate.

He still couldn't believe that he had encountered one though. He had always had a soft spot of tsunderes, especially Yamamoto Rin, the Mistress of the Seventh Sea of Fire and Countess of the Eighth Great Plain of Doom...

Damn you, chuunibyou habits!

That withstanding, the list of his screwed-up classmates went on and on, from that blonde ojou with a superiority complex to that...androgynous...positively lovely angel with gleaming white hair and the cutest, sweetest, most melodic voice he had ever heard.

Goddamnit. He just wanted to dress up the sweet innocent angel in a maid costume and keep him forever. And then maybe splash some water accidentally onto it. And then innocently take off the uniform to dry the angel. And then a light touch there. And then there. And then...

...ARGH! What the hell was wrong with him?

He shivered briefly as the fantasy escaped his mind.

That was a dangerous train of thought. If it had gone any longer, who knows if a physical...reaction would be elicited naturally from his body.

Yep, his entire class was filled with the most messed up people in the world. Oh, by the gods, why did he have to be stuck there?

He hadn't even included the strange red-headed girl that had been shooting him shy glances ever since he first transferred in. What the heck was her problem?

"Hikigaya?"

He suddenly realized that his teacher had stopped talking, and, panicked, he scrambled to formulate an appropriate response. Quickly, he bowed curtly.

"Hai, sensei."

A sudden feeling trepidation fell upon him, and he looked up at his guidance counselor...

...Only to shiver at the slight, deceptively gentle smile that had suddenly formed on her face. His instincts screamed out warnings, and, smiling nervously, he slowly began to back out of the room.

"So you agree with what I just proposed?" The smile grew decidedly wicked. "Then surely you wouldn't mind staying for a few more hours. As I had just been saying merely seconds ago, I have the perfect place for you."

He needed to leave, quickly!

Swiftly, he turned to make his escape, mindlessly tossing the offending piece of paper into a nearby trashcan as he walked towards the exit of the teachers' room. "Later, sensei! I've got an urgent errand I absolutely must run!"

He hadn't even taken three steps before he felt it.

A hand suddenly, and quite roughly, grabbed onto the back of his collar, and he instinctively moved to flip the offender onto the ground before beating the living daylights of her.

He fought the instinct down. It wouldn't do for him to judo-flip his English teacher and guidance counselor onto the ground on his second week of school. He had already joined late in the school year, two weeks into the beginning of the second-year of high school. Having a infraction for violence on his school record immediately would be extraordinarily bad.

"You're coming with me. " she growled, and he felt himself being dragged disgracefully, as if he were a disrespectful dog, across the floor of the teacher's room and onto the well-swept tiles of the school hallway.

He made no effort to resist - after all, it wasn't as if she was going to do something inappropriate - but he couldn't help but wonder where they had gone, or, more worryingly, what she was planning to do.

Innumerable hallways and classrooms passed by before she finally stopped, abruptly halting in a lonely, detached section of the school, filled with dust bunnies and the faintest smell of, of all things, tea.

He looked up.

The light was fading into a dusty orange that scattered through the window and lit up the hallway, illuminating the tendrils of dust that floated effortlessly on the air, as if they were petals floating upon the lazy currents of the waters. The floors seemed untouched in its ethereal beauty, somehow evoking a sense of warmth within him despite its lonely, and seemingly abandoned state.

The scene suddenly shifted from that lonely hallway to a decrepit city block under a pouring backdrop of rain, and, quite suddenly, a powerful feeling of nostalgia hit him.

It was the same feeling that he had felt back then, wasn't it?

Little wonder then it had evoked such fondness from him.

He smiled briefly at the memory, allowing himself to bask in its comfort, before he finally shook it away from him.

It wouldn't do, after all, for him to lose himself in the past. Especially not at this moment.

A frown suddenly flitted across his face.

"Sensei," he asked slowly. "What exactly are you doing?"

Hiratsuka crowed, placing her hands proudly on her hips and letting him drop to the floor gracelessly. "We're here!"

He glanced up at the door that lay in front of them, his eyebrows furrowing into a deeper frown.

Hiratsuka walked forward, placing two hands in a mighty grip on the edge as so to slide the door open.

He started. "Sensei, I don't think..."

SLAM.

"...that's a good idea," he finished under his breath, mentally grumbling at his teacher's brash, almost disrespectful attitude.

Light suddenly filled his vision, and the brilliant white that was revealed sent flickering jolts of pain through his eyes.

* * *

Beautiful.

There was no other way of describing her, no, it, for such a being seemed entirely too perfect to exist in this world.

Raven-black hair fluttered in the sudden zephyr that entered from the open window, as if it were a flag gently, yet proudly, swaying, but remaining so very far out of reach. Porcelain skin glistened in the faint light of the sun, as if it were of the purest snow from the mountains on a brilliant morning. Neatly pressed clothing, of enormously high-quality and cleanliness even for school uniforms, lay loosely on a lean and petite body that seemed to possess a hidden strength within.

And, quite suddenly, a pair of eyes, startlingly dull in color, despite the perfection which lay beneath them, rose to meet his in one brilliant, yet disappointing moment.

He started.

Those eyes…

Bright sapphire blue, filled with youthful brilliance.

Or, he supposed, they were supposed to be.

How could one of those in his age-group not? All, it seemed, were living that youthful dream of theirs, where romance, friendship, and optimism ruled their hearts and minds.

Instead of being filled with that vivid youth, however, they were deadened and dull. Empty and lifeless. Apathetic and uncaring.

Just like his had been, when he had first met him, under the tears of the sky, on that dark, dreary day not even a year before.

It was then he realized that she, too, wasn't perfect, and for a moment, disappointment welled up within him.

But what was he to expect anyways? It was obvious that all human beings were flawed in one respect or another, for it was such flaws that defined what to be human was.

Perfection was always merely an illusion, for in perfection, there was no growth, and only stagnation.

It reminded him of a movie he had watched several years before, whose true meaning he did not realize until recently.

Angels Over Berlin, it was known as in Europe. Or in America, Wings of Desire. A film that followed the immortal angels and their perfection, yet their inability to understand the beautiful flaws and the fleeting, yet brilliant lives, of each individual human that were their charges.

If perfection meant simply seeing in grey, simply existing, and never being moved to tears of sadness or of joy, what was the point of perfection? Why did people pursue the false ideal of perfection so single-mindedly?

Socrates had loosely defined virtue to be knowledge, and Plato had placed at the pinnacle of the Great Chain of Being a complete, wholesome understanding of the universe. The elder Greek philosophers focused on the unreachable ideal, painting a beautiful, fragile picture of it, attempting to define it in spite of their flawed human nature. They spent their lives criticizing those who did not work to achieve this ideal, and those who were focused on the worldly lives they lived.

There was nothing wrong with that.

But, in his opinion, it was Aristotle, and only Aristotle, of the three main Greek philosophers, who had understood the beauty of mankind and its struggle to attain a higher state of being. It was the eternal curse of man to fall to the hand of fate, to be struck down by forces far greater than them. What could one man do against the ruthless wheel of the world anyways?

Yet, despite the overwhelming odds against them, despite the fact that they knew that they could not, and would not, win, they still went against fate.

The knight aloft in the fairy-tales of his childhood always defeated the dragon in one single stroke, before rescuing the princess and riding off into the sunset. He was perfect, invincible, and the monument of the legacy that he left was unbreakable.

The knight grounded in reality in fact faced the dragon with his skin singed and armor half-melted. The knight that actually fought against the dragon had a dented shield that was nigh-useless and a dulled sword that could no longer cut even a bundle of ropes. But in spite of all the pain, and the hopelessness of his situation, the knight still fought on, all for that one, minute chance of success.

Thus, those who chased perfection did not appreciate to the beauty of mankind, nor how failure defined the entirety of the human race.

That's why...

That's why he detested that facade of effortless grace, that mask of flawless accomplishment, that veneer of perfection that served only to fool others, and herself, into believing that they were truly infallible.

Such an act was pathetic and only served as a form of self-validation, one that depended on others' view of them as perfect.

He almost sneered. In the end, those who seemed to be the most perfect possessed the most flaws.

How painfully, yet rightfully ironic. As sadistic as it sounded, those who pursued such perfection deserved the pain and horror that arose as that facade fell apart in front of them.

But in that moment, he couldn't help but be entranced by the figure in front of him. He couldn't help but feel like Romeo looking up at Juliet upon that balcony. He couldn't help but be in awe at the false, yet unspeakably beautiful angel that sat above him.

The red sun shone an impossibly brighter vermilion. The smell of the dusty room filled his nostrils. The wind whistled ever so softly through the crevices of the crumbling walls. The stacked chairs and desks sat, motionless and unabashedly abandoned, against the fragile wall at the back of the room.

And that was how he, the social outcast Hikigaya Hachiman, met the ice-cold beauty Yukinoshita Yukino.

* * *

She was pulled into the dark alleyway by the man, the sharp point of a knife digging into her back.

"Get over there, you little bitch," a raspy voice told her from behind her. "Or I'll make sure you'll regret it."

She had little choice but comply. Never in her life had she been threatened in such an upfront and aggressive manner, and fear gripped her as if it were a tightening noose around her neck.

When she had been younger, her mother had often warned her about the lechers and rapists that roamed the subways and streets of Japan, as well as the stigma and ostracization that came with being a sexual assault victim.

Back then, she had played it off as merely a far-fetched situation that would never happen, like an urban legend, meant only to scare its listeners. A creepypasta, as they were often called in America.

She had never expected it to come true. And now, her mother's words began to recite themselves in her ears, as if they were a portent of the horror that was about to come.

"Now now, girl, be a good little whore and stay silent for me. It might hurt at first, but later it'll get better." The man smiled cruelly. "Or actually, maybe you will enjoy it immediately. Schoolgirls these days are probably loose as fuck anyways."

She squeezed her eyes shut, hot tears of shame and fear slipping down her face, the man's filthy hand closing around her throat and fingers stuffed in her mouth.

Hopeless, she resigned herself to her fate, and she cried bitter tears as she prepared herself for what was to come. The painful exploitation of her body, and the eternal shame that would befall her after the filthy act had been done.

She only hoped it would be over quickly.

But, surprisingly, there was none of the expected pain, no intrusion or violation of her body that she thought would come to pass.

Conversely, there was relief, a sudden reduction of the pain and tightness that had wrapped around her neck. The pressure on her chest lifted, and precious air filled her lungs as she gasped desperately. Panting, she placed her hand on the wall to stabilize herself, stars filling her vision as the oxygenated blood returned to her brain.

A cry of pain erupted from behind her, and quickly she spun around, hands extended in front of her in a position of defense, as meager and feeble as it was.

As if turned out, it wasn't necessary.

A dark figure, clad in shadows and clearly masculine, as given by his wiry, yet broad build, was clutching her assailant's right arm, which held a four-inch knife, twisting and contorting in painfully.

"ARGH! YOU FUCKIN' BASTARD!" The man on the ground, her near rapist, screamed, and swung his left hand at the figure, who stood almost apathetically, not even bringing an arm up to defend.

She wanted to scream out a warning, anything, but her voice caught in her throat, and she could only watch as the fist reached the apex of its swing, before descending furiously down toward her savior's face.

She closed her eyes.

The sickening crunch of breaking bone resonated in the cramped alley, followed by another, even more pained scream.

When she opened her eyes again, the man who had nearly raped her writhed in the figure's grip, his right arm now mangled and twisted in such a brutal fashion it was rendered unusable without medical treatment.

Her eyes shifted to the figure, who held the cuff of her would-be rapist's rumpled shirt, and to the object he gripped in his left hand.

Clink.

Something shot past and above her, and instinctively, she flinched.

She turned her eyes to the projectile, a four-pronged hook with a long length of thick cord extending behind it, which had attached itself to gutter that ran all the way up the alley wall and into the unknown.

A grappling hook gun, she recalled from her limited knowledge of video games.

A sudden zipping sound came from the direction of her savior, and when she turned back, he was already leaving, gliding smoothly through the air as the cord retracted itself back into the innards of the gun.

And for a moment, one single, glorious moment, as the figure sped past her towards the rooftop, her almost-rapist clutched in his hand, the light of the setting sun illuminated him fully.

A glimpse of his face was all she caught, but the memory seared itself into her mind, as clear and lucid as a sunny day.

The boy that had saved her dog over a full year ago, the boy that had saved her from her horrible fate merely moments before, was the quiet, almost invisible boy who had transferred into their class merely two weeks into the new school year.

Hikigaya Hachiman.

Or Hikki, as she liked to call him.

* * *

 **AN: I'll probably edit this out later, because frankly, I was way too tired to proofread.**

 **Yes, Hachiman has a different mindset. Yes, I was inspired by The Crimson Lord AGAIN (if you've read Deprived, you should know what I mean).**

 **On the philosophy: Leibniz and Pangloss represent optimist philosophy, which Voltaire mocks in his book Candide. Kierkegaard is said to be the first existentialist philosopher, and his philosophy can supposedly be summed up through that one quotation. Aristotle and Plato can be briefly be summarized by the painting The School of Athens: while Plato points upwards, Aristotle lays his hand flat.**

 **I only have a surface understanding of philosophy, so don't trust me 100% on its explanation all the time as this fic continues. If you have a lot of experience with philosophy, feel free to review.**

 **Canon Hachiman...is really weird. In a lot of ways, I feel like he's being overly dramatic and cynical without truly having the dark mindset, as if such a thing is "cool" and makes him unique. His "philosophy" contradicts itself multiple times, and his rants make me feel that he really doesn't understand what being world-weary or cynical is.**

 **He's been through a lot, yes, and it's refreshing to see a departure from stereotypical school slice-of-life stuff, but I still feel like he's a fake person, deceiving himself into believing that he is "alone" and "friendless." In that sense, Watari Wataru is extraordinarily clever in catering to the side of us that kind of wants to be that person.**

 **Maybe its just me.**

 **What I do like is that Watari Wataru explores character personality a lot, especially concerning masks and true natures. What he doesn't incorporate in the light novels, however, is the sheer danger of having two distinct personalities. The two dangers lie in either further polarization or a confused fusing of each, both of which are extremely bad. The first can lead to dissociative identity disorder, the second a complete inability to understand real vs fake emotions.**

 **Despite the supposedly cynical and more realist nature the fandom claims to have, it is still is going the harem route. But that's fine. Just a teeny bit disappointing, but to be honest, I can't help but cheer for Hikigaya XD**

 **Anyways, this fic is going to try to raise questions about the validity the teenage "dreams" that Hikigaya views with such disgust, as well as the validity of his own philosophy. I hope you guys find it interesting.**

 **My draconian English teacher is trying to teach us philosophy, so expect more.**

 **This is probably the strangest fic I'll ever write in my life. This could technically go into a crossover, but that'd ruin the entire point of concealing Hachiman's mentor's identity. Although one could probably easily discern his identity, given the context clues, summary, and cover.**

 **The funny thing is, Hachiman actually directly mentions this person, if in a roundabout manner, in the light novels.**


End file.
